Why and the Reason
by Revengent
Summary: When House starts to see not only Amber, but Kutner too, he wants some answers and will do anything to find out the reason why. Post 5x21, oneshot.


**So I wrote this after seeing 5x21. I'm kind of "eh" about this, it wasn't at all how I intended it to be, but it is what it is.**

**So what happens when when House starts seeing Kutner, as well as Amber?**

**Reviews and comments are always welcomed.**

**I don't own House, and any similarities you may find with anything else are purely coincidental.**

* * *

When he saw her leaning over his piano, his heart stilled, not sure what to think. She looked exactly as he remembered; fine blond hair that brushed against her shoulders, bright, sparkling eyes and thick lips that curled into a sly grin. Amber Volakis. Right next to him, whispering in his ear.

But she was dead, House remembered. He knows that for sure. Wilson mourned over her for months, and didn't let House forget that fact. So she wasn't real – couldn't be. She was just his imagination, a dream, a hallucination, something.

But in the morning, she was still there, sitting across from his bed, lounging in an armchair and staring right at him. Why was she bothering him?

"Why are you here?" House asked.

She shrugged. "I come back, invading your mind, and that's all you can say?"

"So you admit it. You're a hallucination."

"I'm whatever you make of me," Amber said.

House sighed. "I'd like to know _why_ I'm seeing you, of all people. You weren't my girlfriend."

Amber pushed a stray strand of hair behind her ears. "Maybe you're under stress. Has anything…unusual happened lately?"

House's mind immediately thought of Kutner, dead, with a bullet through his head. He opted not to tell Amber what he thought, although his motives were useless because if she was a hallucination, she knew what he was thinking anyway.

She slowly smiled and leaned forward, putting her elbows on her knees and resting her chin in her hands. "Anything about another young doctor dying? From something that could have been avoided?"

House ignored her.

"Do you feel like it could have been avoided, only if you knew? Like with me? You could have done something to stop his death, like mine, if only you would have known what was going to happen?"

House had had enough. He threw back his covers, grabbed his cane that was resting against the nightstand and limped into the other room.

This was insane. He was seeing his best friend's dead girlfriend, after she had been gone for almost a year and not thought about for many months. But here she was, in his mind asking things that was he was thinking in the back of his mind. She was his subconscious, bringing out what he didn't want to consider.

He wanted Amber to go away.

Going into the kitchen, wanting to pour himself a glass of scotch and attempt to drown Amber out, he flipped on the light. But he stopped short.

House shook his head, but when he looked again, _he_ was still there.

Rummaging through his cabinets in his kitchen, Kutner was there, looking as real as House had remembered him. Hearing House's presence, Kutner glanced over to him and gave him a puzzling look.

"Do you have anything in here to eat?"

House took a few steps closer to Kutner. He was grinning, like he always had. House wondered if the last week had been one big dream, one where Kutner was alive and not suicidal, and there was some reason why Kutner had broken into his apartment, which would explain why he was here now.

"Something wrong House?" Kutner asked.

House reached out and put a hand on Kutner's arm. He felt just as real and solid as when Amber brushed up against him last night. Kutner looked down at House's hand.

"Uh…"

House drew his hand back, and furrowed his eyebrows together, thinking.

"You're dead," House said pointedly.

Kutner shrugged. "I guess."

"You killed yourself."

Kutner tilted his head. "It wasn't murder?"

"You're just messing with me. You know I had thought that. But you did it to yourself," House explained.

Kutner nodded.

"Why?" House whispered.

Kutner scoffed and waved his hand. "You don't really care why; you just want to know because you can't stand not knowing why. You're mad because something happened that you can't explain or do anything about."

House began to speak, but Kutner cut him off.

"Come on House, forget about it. It happened. I'm fine, really."

Somewhere in the other room, House's phone began to ring. Kutner craned his head to look into House's living room.

"You better get that," Kutner suggested.

House limped over and picked up the phone, and snarled at Foreman, saying yes, he would be there soon. He hoped that when he hung up, Kutner would still be there. But hurrying back into the kitchen, Kutner was nowhere to be seen, and going back into his bedroom, Amber was gone as well.

--

But it wasn't long before they showed up again. Taub, Thirteen and Foreman were discussing a patient, listing possible causes for an endless list of symptoms, but House wasn't listening; he was too fixated on Kutner and Amber, who he was now seeing both at the same time. Amber was leaning against the sink with her arms crossed, and Kutner sat in the empty chair between Taub and Thirteen, his eyes darting back and forth as the other doctors exchanged quips. It was as though nothing had changed, and Kutner was alive and about to intervene in the conversation, offering an explanation that the two were missing. The only difference was that House was the only able to see Kutner and Amber, that he was sure of.

House tried ignoring the two dead people that were in the room and ordered the others to start treatment on their patient. He limped into his office, hoping for some quiet so he could try to sort out his troubled thoughts. However, sitting down he saw Kutner and Amber taking the seats in front of them.

"Idiots," Amber muttered. "I can't believe that they think it's an infection. The LP clearly proved that-"

"It can be. The patient's white blood cell count is elevated," Kutner argued.

"Only slightly, not enough to-"

"Stop it!" House spat. Kutner and Amber looked away from each other to House, who was rubbing his temples with his eyes closed.

"So Kutner, why did you bury a bullet into your head?" Amber asked.

Kutner winced. "Can we not talk about that?"

Amber shrugged. "Fine. Don't talk about your problems. Look how far it got you."

House thought his head was going to explode with every comment that Kutner and Amber uttered. He was truly going inane.

"So Amber, now that we're both, you know, how about that date?" Kutner asked.

Amber snorted and crossed her legs, right over left. "Over my dead body."

Kutner squinted and bit his bottom lip. "So is that a yes?"

"Shut up!"

Kutner and Amber looked over to the troubled diagnostician who just shouted.

"Something bothering you?" Amber asked.

"Oh, can it be the fact that two employees that I have seen dead are right in front of me, chatting about symptoms and asking each other on dates?" House shouted.

"House?"

House, Kutner and Amber looked over, seeing Taub holding the door open and leaning into House's office.

"Are you…okay?" Taub asked.

House looked at Kutner and Amber in front of him, then back to Taub. House couldn't say that he was _seeing_ dead people. He would get crazy looks and intense medical treatment for sure.

"Yeah. Fine." House flipped through papers on his desk. "Why are you here anyway, aren't you supposed to be with the patient?"

"You sent Thirteen and Foreman to do that. Are you sure you're okay? You were yelling, and there's nobody in here…"

"You were imagining things. Now go away."

Turning away from Taub, House gasped in shock to see Kutner and Amber gone again. He swallowed, and wondered how long this was going to continue.

--

House stood outside on the balcony behind his office, leaning over looking down at the parking lot below. He couldn't get the image of Amber and Kutner out of his mind. Even though he knew they weren't real, it made him somewhat sick that they were in his mind – and that made them real enough.

They both had died under unfortunate circumstances, one by choice and another by accident.

"You don't think my death is an accident?"

House looked to his left to see Kutner sitting on the ledge on the balcony.

"No. You decided on blowing your brains out," House said.

Kutner frowned. "You don't have to be so harsh. Are you even going to ask why-"

"No."

"You're not even a bit curious?"

"…No."

"You're lying. Of course you want to know. You want to know everything."

House sighed and looked to his other side to glare at Amber, who had just spoken. "You're here again too?"

"You want to know the _why_ in everything. You can't just be satisfied with _because,_" Amber explained.

"She's right," Kutner said. Amber crossed her arms.

"Flattery and compliments won't get you a date," she said.

House leaned over to Kutner and whispered, "Just keep at it. Remember, where did her legs go up to again?"

"Canada."

"Right," House said, giving Kutner a high-five.

Amber scoffed and rolled her eyes. "Boys."

House stopped and let his hand fall to his side. He was carrying on a conversation with two people, knowing full well that they weren't really there. Why was he really seeing Amber and Kutner?

"Kutner, were you depressed?" House asked.

Kutner shrugged. "Did I seem like it?"

"No. Not at all. There was nothing to make it seem like you were ever upset about anything."

"So maybe I wasn't depressed. Maybe I was just…tired of everything," Kutner muttered.

"That makes no sense," Amber spat. "There needs to be a better reason than that."

"You're trying to tell me why I committed suicide? I think I would know why," Kutner argued.

"But that's a dumb reason. And a lie. Why did you really?" Amber persisted.

"Does there have to be a reason?"

"Yes!"

"Are you sure you want to know?"

"I don't really care, but House wants to know."

House held his head in his hands, trying to block out the bickering between Kutner and Amber. But it wasn't working, the sounds of their voices continued to echo in his ears.

And the last thing House remembered was Kutner asking, "Are you alright?" to which Amber answered, "Of course, change the subject."

--

House slowly opened his eyes, and much to his relief, he saw Wilson sitting next to him. Finally, somebody that was really _real. _He looked around his surrounds, and realized that he was in a hospital bed and it was night.

"Thirteen and Taub found you unconscious on your balcony," Wilson stated simply. He ran a hand through his hair, and sighed. "What happened? Did you not feel good?"

"I'm fine," House said. _If you don't include I'm constantly seeing your dead girlfriend and my old employee._

"Taub said that you were talking to yourself earlier. What's that about?" Wilson asked.

House sighed. "Nothing. I was just trying to work through a diagnosis."

Wilson looked down at his friend in worry. "Do you need to talk…about anything? You can talk to me you know about…whatever. Because you've been quiet about some things."

House knew that was Wilson's way of saying that he could talk to him about what happened to Kutner, because House had not talked about it anymore to anyone, other than Amber and Kutner himself, which was insane. He didn't know the reason why he was seeing them, but he wanted to find out.

"Well if you decide to change your mind and you want to talk, you know where to reach me." Wilson got up from his chair, and hovered by the door, looking back at his friend. "You can tell me anything, you know that right?"

House nodded. "Yes, let me whisper my deepest secrets to you while we have a slumber party."

Wilson smiled slightly and shook his head. "It's okay House. Really."

"James is just trying to help you."

House groaned. _They_were back. He struggled to sit up as Amber strode over and sat on the edge of his bed, while Kutner flipped through House's medical chart.

"What do you think _James_ would have said if I told him I was having conversations with dead people?" House asked.

"You can't ignore that we're here House," Kutner said. "You have to deal with it."

"I forgot how annoying you could be," House said.

"Aw, you don't miss me?" Kutner asked, with some disappointment in his voice.

"It's clear that he does. Why else would he being having visions of us?" Amber pointed out. "He was affected by our deaths because he thinks that he should have been able to do something about them. With me, what if he didn't need to be picked up that one night of the bush crash? I would still be alive. And with you, Kutner-"

"Be…quiet," House said slowly, his voice growing louder on the second half of the sentence.

"Yeah," Kutner said agreeing. "With me, House thinks that he should have been able to see the signs, be able to see find some reason for what I did, because when without that, he's without reason. And when he doesn't have reason, he doesn't know what can happen, and that scares the hell out of him."

House shut his eyes. They were right. He was always fixated on why things happened and the reason behind them. Amber's death haunted him, because the reason was because he had called out in the middle of the night, and fate had taken a turn and killed her without thought. There was a reason for her death. But Kutner's death secretly terrified him, because there wasn't a reason.

"You don't need to know the answers to everything, House," Kutner said.

"I can try!" House shouted.

"Why did you electrocute yourself that one time? You said that wasn't a suicide attempt." Amber flipped her hair over her shoulder and looked over at Kutner, who was now leaning against the wall, then back to House. "If you really wanted to kill yourself, you would have done like Kutner and made sure it was _final._"

"I wasn't trying to kill myself. I just wanted to know…" House's voice trailed off.

"Answers?" Amber asked.

"Yeah."

"That was dumb," Kutner commented.

"And what you did wasn't?"

Kutner shrugged. "Depends how you look at it. I got what I wanted. However, you still don't know."

"Are you telling me to kill myself?" House asked incredulously.

"No!" Kutner shouted, putting his hands up in defense. "I'm just saying to find out what you want."

"I'm trying to. But you won't tell me!"

"I can't tell you."

House pushed himself off the bed and walked over to Kutner. "Tell me. Now."

Kutner shook his head. "You have to figure it out yourself."

House placed his arms against Kutner's shoulders and shoved him. "What was wrong with you? Were you bored?"

"House, stop it," Amber ordered.

House ignored the blonde women's shouts and continued integrating Kutner. "Did you express any pain to me that I missed?"

"I dunno, think about it," Kutner said nonchalantly.

"House? What are you doing?"

House turned around to see Cuddy standing at the door in shock.

"They won't go away!" House shouted.

Cuddy looked around the room. "…Who won't go away?"

"Kutner. And Amber. They won't leave me alone, and they won't tell me anything."

"I think we've told you plenty," Amber said.

"Stop!" House shouted.

"House," Cuddy said, taking a tentative step towards House. "Come lay down, and we can talk about this-"

"I just want to know why," House muttered.

--

House lay in his own bed, a day after his outbreak at the hospital. He ended having to be sedated because he wouldn't cooperate and would not stop shouting about Kutner and Amber. Although he had said he wasn't, he still could see Kutner and Amber. At the moment, they were both were on the other side of the room, talking silently to each other.

House's desire to know is what always kept him going. He knew that, and was not ashamed of it. Sometimes he didn't find out why, and it bothered him, but he would move on. But this was someone's life…Kutner's. There had to be a reason behind why.

House sighed. The only person that would ever know was Kutner himself, and he was gone. House would never know, and neither would be the hallucination Kutner that was here now.

House looked over to see Kutner smiling at him.

Sometimes, things just happened. Like someone dying because an accident. You want them to have a better reason besides that, but there wasn't anything more to it.

Then, without warning, Kutner and Amber disappeared, and somehow House knew that they weren't going to be coming back.

He was kind of lonely.

* * *

**So just let me know what you think...**

**...and I don't know if anyone noticed it, but I meant for Kutner to be the _why_ and for Amber to be the _reason._ Yeah, subtle, I know. But anyways, thanks for reading!**

**~Rev**


End file.
